How fun! We won! What you don't see is how stupid and scared I felt stepping onto that field.
Don't believe what you see on my Instagram or Facebook page.
Because it doesn't tell you the truth. Not all of it. I'm a straight shooter, honest, direct to a fault. Anyone who knows me will tell you that I pull no punches. Shit, my whole brand is built on helping other people be authentic.
(On the run? Listen to this story read to you.)
And yet, lately when I sit down with friends and colleagues, they've been saying things like, "Well, you've been busy!" and "Business must be great, right?" and I wonder where they get that information from. And then I remember: ME.
It's not that I purposely mislead or lie. The stuff that I post is true. Things are going well! But there seems to be this outsized idea of what I'm doing compared to what I really am. To what anyone really is.
So you can't believe what you see in my feed, and here's why:
1. I only post pictures where I look halfway decent. My face looks fug in many of them, and you don't know that because I don't show you.
2. I post my own successes and usually say nothing about the other shit. OK, so I had a piece published here or was interviewed there. You don't know the things I didn't get or was afraid to try for.
3. You think I'm out all the time. But I'm not. In fact, I'm often right here, in my studio apartment. I like being here. Sometimes it takes great effort for me to go out, and when I do, I usually am so thrilled I'll take pictures of whatever I'm doing.
4. You assume that because I'm single in NYC, I'm really happening. Lest you think life in NYC is a non-stop carousel of craft cocktails and sex, let me tell you: It's not. I spend more time doing laundry. A great Saturday is a run through the park, a visit to the farmer's market or Sephora, followed by a nap. There are no photos of these things. Lots of times I'm home, feeling I should be out, and sometimes I'm out, and wish I could be home.
5. I'm about to go on a vacation. THIS is where things are about to go off the rails, because for many sad, stressed, or boring weeks this winter, you heard nothing from me—you didn't know I had a breakup, or that I was lied to by an old friend. You don't know that I look in the mirror and wonder what the hell I'm doing with my hair or my life.
But in two days, there I'll be, waving photos of the Mediterranean at you, shoving a cocktail umbrella up your virtual nose. I'll be on a cruise through the Greek Islands, so you can expect close-up shots of olive oil, wine, pictures of me and some friends posing on cobbled roads or laughing at something no one remembers. There will be the fancy food arranged like a still life and sunsets over the water.
Promise me you won't turn around and chastise yourself for what "other people" are doing. Or submit to this fantasy that everyone else is footloose and fancy free while you're trying to get ketchup stains out of a T-shirt. For years, I never took a vacation, not one. So don't extrapolate and think that "everyone's doing cool stuff"; they're not. In fact, there have been plenty of times I've seen you running down the beach or eating a perfect picnic lunch (remember that), or looking flawless and happy and content.
We haven't been altogether honest, have we.
Let me tell you what I'm afraid of right now as I finish packing:
- I will bring the wrong shoes / forget a charger / run out of underwear.
- I will miss out on something big while I'm away.
- My cat will die while I'm away (it has happened once before).
- I'll suffer horrendous diarrhea. Or be constipated for days.
- I'll have to be airlifted out of somewhere in Croatia due to some horrible injury.
- I'll lose my passport / my phone / my travel companion and be crying and no one will speak English.
- I will not be able to relax, won't be or have any fun, and have to lie to everyone about it later.
You hopefully will NOT do something so drastic as to end your life (please God no), or pick up a dangerous drug habit, or any of those things. But you may, like many, suffer despair by a thousand cuts, if you allow yourself to be seduced by what you see.
So promise me you won't.
For more stuff like this, check out territrespicio.com. Like listening to content? Follow me at Umano.
Follow Terri Trespicio on Twitter: www.twitter.com/TerriT
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